I'm going to jump right in, so follow along.

Fighting to maintain status quo planning regulations, for fear of losing one's personal property rights, often results in the rights of others being suppressed. When one group clamors to maintain the current planning regulations, they essentially reduce everyone's choices for housing, employment, transportation, and sustainable living. With the proposed EAR amendments, Walton County has found itself at a crossroads; it has the opportunity to explore other ways of doing things, or stay the path for fear of the unknown. The Planning Commission is open to and needs community suggestions. The Planning Department is doing the best they can with the tools they have available to them, and the NIMBY's and 's abound. Now, there's a new acronym to chew on.

So what does all this mean? What it means is that the current Comprehensive Development Plan and Land Use Development Code are written in favor of planning elements that encourage people to spread out across the land, removed from essential services with very little rhyme or reason. What's wrong with that? What's wrong with that is that not everyone favors this type of living arrangement and it greatly reduces the opportunity for other living arrangements. This type of regulation was fine when very few people actually lived here, though with higher population and more need for employment and services, spreading everyone across the land like peanut butter eats...

James Howard Kunstler, author of The Long Emergency, recently visited Seaside to participate in a Seaside Institute forum on the economic impact on New Urbanism. He was also the recipient of the 2009 Seaside Prize for his written contributions toward furthering the New Urbanism movement.

As a follow up, he dedicates one of his weekly podcasts to his visit to the South, including Seaside and other New Urbanist communities. Listen in for Jim's perspective of how these communities came to be and how they are functioning now. KunstlerCast Podcast #51.

Jim explains how the South has developed to the level we see today, due to inexpensive fuel and as a result the car is the unit of design. Inexpensive fuel encouraged sprawl by providing massive highway projects and the ability to cheaply condition living space (air conditioning), making the South more hospitable to human habitation. He looks at how this building engine caused the New Urbanists to became hostages of massive scale projects and how those projects are waning in the new economy.

New Urbanism was a counter to the increasingly popular suburban developments and an effort to recreate communities that capture the spirit of a place. Seaside was the original iconic New Urbanist project that has often been criticized for being elitist. The owner and designers, Robert Davis & DPZ, never dreamed it to be so hugely successful, and in fact, envisioned a bohemian beach town that would be...